


Memories don't float, they swim

by Geisterschiff



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Day At The Beach, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Memory Loss, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-30
Updated: 2018-10-30
Packaged: 2019-08-11 02:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16466663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Geisterschiff/pseuds/Geisterschiff
Summary: When Lance loses his memory due to an injury sustained during a battle, Keith and the others try one thing after another to bring his memory back. They are slowly running out of the options, but something tells Keith this little beach visit they have planned, is the solution they have been waiting for.





	Memories don't float, they swim

**Author's Note:**

> My gift for Kiwi (hystericalcherries) for the Keith Birthday Exchange. I really loved your memory loss and day at the beach prompt, so I kind of combined them. Hope you enjoy it! :)

The squeeze on his shoulder is soft and easy, but Keith feels like none of his wounds had ever hurt more than this. Not even the seemingly deadly ones. The warm palm eats through his clothes and through his skin with the intensity of spilled acid.  
“I’m sure this will work.” Shiro’s voice sounds to Keith’s ears like they are miles apart. Like he is whispering through a glass door. Like he himself has a hard time believing these words.  
The desperate need to say something forces Keith’s mouth to open, but all possible words get stuck in his throat. What is the correct thing to say at this moment? We will see? I hope so? It has to? Has it, really? Haven’t they tried more than enough already? Still, underneath the negative pile wavers a little glimmer of hope Keith is not ready to stomp out yet.  
In the end Keith says nothing, just shrugs Shiro’s hand off and steps into the scene they have been watching from the door. 

Lance sits at the counter and Hunk busies around the kitchen. He talks and talks while Lance’s mouth is shut and it’s not even the most surreal moment of these last weeks.  
“What are you doing?” Keith forces on a smile, but is sure it doesn’t reach his eyes. He also knows what they are doing. There is a distinct scent spread throughout the room his heart remembers from too many nights and aches with every breath he takes. When Lance flashes him a smile it reconnects with a nose dusted with flour and garlic scented kisses, and Keith just wants to squeeze his eyes shut and run away.  
Lance opens his mouth, but hesitates and Keith watches him search around in his brain, where there is too little right now.  
“Uh… Hunk?” Lance’s eyes flick to Hunk, who confirms with a nod, that yes, that is his name. “Sorry, seems like I had been really bad with names.”  
*You never were. You were the one to remember names of whole village populations just to make them feel important, because the Paladin of Voltron knew their name.* Words sit heavy on Keith’s tongue and taste like bones burned to ashes. He wants to spill them out, but Coran’s warning constantly hisses into his ear like a snake: “Don’t overwhelm him. Show him things he liked and let’s hope it will ease his memory back. But never tell him directly, that might permanently block him.”  
“It’s fine, Lance.” Hunk’s voice sounds encouraging, and Keith wishes he could be able to weave a similar tone in between his words. He is always afraid too much of his pain is seeping through. Too afraid it could overwhelm Lance, so he doesn’t spend as much time with him as he would have liked.  
“Hunk was showing me how to bake garlic knots.” Lance says and Keith can feel the sob he can’t let out twist around in his stomach.  
“Oh, garlic knots, you say? I like these.” Keith shuffles closer, hands shoved into pockets, so no one can see how he is digging nails into his palms to be able to maintain a steady voice. “Mind if I try some?”  
“Of course not!” Lance sounds cheerful and Keith sees black. Where a loving banter would usually come, because what else had driven him to bake garlic knots with Lance in the middle of the night, again and again, there is only dry agreement now.  
Keith slides on the stool next to Lance and ignores the voices calling him to hug his arms around Lance’s waist like he usually does. To press his forehead against Lance’s nape and whisper hushed words that will crash open the locked door to his memory. To do things that could cause him to never get his Lance back. 

* * *

Sleeping in his old bed again is bad. In the first days Keith could only toss and turn, not getting any rest.  
Sleeping alone is worse. Keith is so used to their evening routine he still offers towels and combs to thin air. There is too much space in his narrow bed and nothing to fill it with.  
The worst thing, though, is the waking up. Keith rouses while huddled against the wall. It’s warmed by his own body heat and the illusion of closeness gives him comfort. At least until he reaches out to pull Lance closer, to brush a hand through his hair, to run his palm over his back. The only thing he gets are aching knuckles as he slams them against the wall and tears prickling in the corners of his eyes.  
He rolls out of the bed with his eyes glued shut and his brain wanting to return to the place where nothing hurts. Where Lance doesn’t need to dig around in his memory for their names every time he wants to talk to them. Where Lance’s smile isn’t polite, but the perfect nuance between cocky and happy. Where Lance holds his hand when they wake up, fingers laced and breath hot against Keith’s collarbone, as he asks for five more minutes in a sleepy whisper. 

“Keith?” It’s Pidge’s voice and a knock on his door that stops him from curling back under the covers.  
“Yeah? Come in.” He might not be presentable enough, but he also might not care in the slightest right now.  
Pidge looks more worn down than after the most strenuous battle - her hair a mess, her skin looking paper thin, and her glasses askew. But there is a little glimmer of a fire that refused to die and flickers with a new chance.  
“We are in the visible proximity of BT-023.”  
The words bounce off the walls the same way Keith bounces to the floor as he shoots from the bed still tangled in the sheets.  
“Keith? Are you alright?” Pidge is at his side in an instant, steadying hand at his back helping him untangle before he sits up.  
“I am… I am fine.” Keith stumbles on his words, fingers winding around the sheets and he tries to keep his hopes low, tries to stop it before it overflows, but the little spark inside of him just won’t listen. It’s a boiling water that bubbles up to his throat.  
“How much longer?” His eyes almost burn a hole in his own wrists.  
Pidge settles on the ground next to him. “We should reach it tomorrow, I’m sure.”  
Keith nods and his eyes close. He has until tomorrow to hope the location they are headed to will rouse a reaction out of Lance. They have tried so much already and there have been little glimpses here and there. Moments when Lance cocked his head to the side and his eyes had a peculiar, absent look. Like he was trying to grab at something in front of his face he couldn’t see, but knew it was there. Felt it.  
Those moments gave Keith the feeling they were chipping away at the barrier holding Lance’s memories back and they could pry it open with any of their next steps.  
“It will work, or?” Keith still has the hope, but he also has the fear. It’s the hissing snake coiled in his stomach that rises every time when too much hope sprouts.  
Pidge pats at his arm and it startles the snake to pull back. She grabs his hand, laces their finger together and squeezes tight. “It will. Even if it should be only the first memory we squeeze out of him, it will.” Her shoulder pressing into his is soothing, and so is the tired voice ringing with renewed spark. 

* * *

Keith can’t stop his heart from beating a mile a minute as they walk down the rocky path. It’s from a mix of emotions - anxiety quarrels with hope over who can make his heart beat faster. Yet, it is better than the stillness of another failed try. Before they found the planet with the fitting environment, Keith felt powerless wringing his head over what else they could try. 

Keith squeezes his hands tighter around the two parasols they had thrown together from scraps, and watches Lance walk a few steps ahead of him next to Allura. She talks his hears off, but today Lance looks more lively as well and he throws back just as many words. His steps have a little spring, his hands gesticulate wildly and the shadow of former Lance shines through. Maybe it seeps through the cracks in the current Lance they managed to form. 

They walk the winding path down the small hill when Lance stops dead in his track and Keith almost runs into him. He can’t find it in himself to be mad, though.  
“Oh, wow! This is amazing.” The bag stuffed with towels lies at his feet where he had dropped it, as he gapes at the sight in front of them.  
It’s the closest place to beach they managed to find this far from Earth. Of course, there were other beaches, but purple sand or yellow water were hardly going to trigger Lance’s memories.  
The sand here is a soft, creamy white, the water a bright, turquoise blue and there are even palm trees. Sun reflects on the water surface in a blinding sparkle, and Keith nudges Lance’s shoulder as he steps next to him.  
“Incredible, right?”  
There is a glassy sheen to Lance’s eyes, and a blush dusts his cheeks. “Yeah. Yeah it does.” When he looks at Keith, Keith’s heart stops, and he is falling in love all over again. Lance’s face just shines, blinding more than the sun reflecting off waves. It still does when tears roll down his cheeks and Keith almost drops the parasols.  
“Lance! Are you alright?” Panic is gushing out with every of Keith’s words.  
“I am! I am, sorry!” Lance waves his hands around. “Just… I have no clue where they came from, but emotions just welled up in me and… sorry.” Lance wipes at his cheeks with his palms, a smile on his lips, and Keith’s heart does a somersault. Maybe they should have come here sooner. Maybe that would have made everything more easier.  
“That’s fine, don’t apologize. If you feel anything, just…” Keith gives Lance an expectant look, which Lance answers with a nod. Neither of them can move after that and where Keith stares at strange emotion swirls in Lance’s eyes, Lance stares right back. Until he lifts his hand and brushes his thumb across Keith’s cheek. Keith holds his breath and almost holds his heart too.  
“You were important to me, weren’t you? More than any of the others.”  
Keith withstands the cat-like urge to lean his head into Lance’s palm and to let out a gross sob that would sound awfully close to a “yes.” He closes his eyes and smiles instead, hoping it’s a nudge enough for Lance.  
They notice the others are already several hundred meters ahead only when Shiro’s voice urges them on. 

* * *

It takes over half an hour before they build everything up. Four differently colored parasols are huddled together and towels are spread in the shadows the parasols create. They have cooling bags with drinks and food, some kind of sun cream Hunk rubs into Pidge’s pale back. They even managed to scramble out a blow up balloon. It’s as blue as Lance’s eyes, which are staring at the ocean. A strange longing, hunger even, reflects in them, and it’s hard to miss. 

Keith finishes putting the sun cream onto his legs before he calls out to him.  
“Lance.”  
Lance whips around and it looks like the hunger is smothered while his eyes focus. That’s a painful tug at Keith’s heart - he hoped Lance’s look meant something. He hoped to uncurl it further with his intended question. He still asks.  
“Want to go for a swim?”  
Lance shifts on the spot. It’s more of a jerk that almost sends him off his towel and into the sand.  
“I…” His eyes glance at the ocean, but come back to look at Keith. “I’m not sure if I should? Did I even know how to? I mean, maybe I did, but I don’t remember and I don’t remember how to and-” 

Touching Lance’s soft skin directly after weeks of no contact is electrifying and Keith has to swallow before he can talk to Lance, who also gulped down the rest of his words, when Keith touched him.  
“I’m sure your body will remember. And if not, we can always teach you again.” Keith’s smile brings a smile to Lance’s lips as well and he nods, obviously eager to go to swim now. He grabs Keith’s hand when the stand and Keith’s world turns backwards as they walk towards the water. He doesn’t realize they are the only two that do until they are waist in. 

Keith is lost. He is here in the middle of nowhere on BT-023, holding hands with Lance, who doesn’t remember him and who looks like an excited child as one small wave after another comes to lick at his naked chest. The water is warm, much warmer than he had expected and Keith hopes thinking about why that is will distract him from the urge to hug and kiss Lance.  
The splash, which comes up to his face and leaves him dripping wet, wakes him up from his trance. His hair clings to his skin and his eyes burn because of the salt.  
“What the hell, Lance?” Keith rubs at his eyes.  
“I was asking you how this swimming worked. Three times. What were you distracted by?” Lance’s laugh rings in Keith’s ears so loud he almost feels deaf. The heat in his cheeks is rising and rising and they are still holding hands, which Keith realizes when Lance’s hand squeezes his.  
“Just… just getting lost in thoughts. “ He knows Lance is not going to believe that. He had lost his memory, not became stupid. To avoid further questions, he wriggles his hand out of Lance’s grip. “So, swimming… swimming goes like this.” He doesn’t see any better way than to simply show Lance by swimming once around him. He feels those blue eyes watch every of his movements and that fact doesn’t ease the warmth of his cheeks in the slightest.  
“So, like this… hmm…”  
Keith hears Lance muse.  
A splash comes and the next ten seconds are the second worst moment in Keith’s life, right after the one where he tried to get an unconscious Lance to the healing pod in time. Now he is standing in the middle of BT-023’s beach, looking around. But Lance is nowhere to be found and Keith’s heart just stops.  
“Lance?” Keith’s voice is an undignified squeak, which he realizes, but how he sounds is the last of his concerns right now.  
Lance emerges exactly three heartbeats later with a loud yowl. Keith’s swimming demonstration doesn’t compare to the smoothness of movements Lance is showing. He digs his toes into the sand under his feet and smiles.  
As he thought - Lance’s brain might not remember, but his body certainly does. 

* * *

Getting Lance out of the ocean is like trying to gauge out and unruly child. Hunk has to throw him over his shoulder and carry him out while Lance is *kicking*. They both laugh until their cheeks are red and Keith’s hurt just by looking at that. His heart does too.  
Their beach visit seems to work, but not. There are several instances where Keith catches something peculiar reflected in Lance’s eyes. But it never stays. The moments are so short, so insubstantial they are gone before Keith can grasp it. 

When their skin is soaked in salt, when the balloon is busted by their vigorous play and their cooling bangs are filled with wrappers and empty bottle only, they start to pack up.  
Keith folds the second parasol and ties it together when someone nudges his side. It’s Hunk, who points towards the ocean with a warm smile.  
“You know how to get back, right?”  
Keith is confused until he glances past Hunk to see Lance standing close to the water. Keith’s stomach is smaller than his fist and his face is void of any color.  
“I… we… no, I can’t stay here with him.” Keith clutches the parasol, but Hunk takes it away without a blink.  
“You can. You have to. You two need to talk.”  
“We talk every day, Hunk.” Keith tries, but the look Hunk gives him clearly indicates such stupid answer won’t fool him.  
“You know, what I mean, Keith. You have felt it too today, haven’t you? You especially. Lance is close and if anyone can help him reach through the barrier to his memories, it’s you.”  
Of course Keith felt it. But he is still afraid it was just a game his mind played. That his heart just imagined what he wanted to see. The blinding fear of facing the truth shakes his whole core.  
Keith swallows the stone wedged in his throat. When did he become such a coward? Probably at the moment when his constant rushing forward costed him his lover. When it caused a stupid mistake that took all Lance’s memories and left behind an empty box.  
“Can you tell the others we will come back later?” There is a faint shiver in Keith’s voice and he looks at Hunk with fists dug deep in his pockets.  
“Of course. Just get back before it gets too cold.” 

Keith watches Hunk collect the parasols and join the others at the edge of the beach, before he manages the first step towards Lance. He slides next to Lance, shoulder brushing against shoulder, and Lance greets him with a silent “Hey.”  
The sound of the waves washes over them, and Keith feels Lance’s proximity. The warmth that seeps into his skin. The warmth that has been a constant in his life.  
“Thank you for today.”  
Keith’s eyes flick up to Lance when he speaks.  
“I really enjoyed it.”  
“I’m happy you did.” Of course Keith is. But he also has words on his tongue he wants to ask, but can’t. To find out if enjoyment was the only thing their day at the beach brought is a terrifying prospect. “But it wasn’t just my idea. Everyone worked really hard to arrange it and-”  
“But it was.”  
Keith blinks when Lance interrupts him. He stares at the waves as one rolls over the top of the previous ones, again and again.  
“It was originally your idea, wasn’t it? To bring me to the beach.” Lance’s hand tugs at Keith’s arm and forces Keith’s hand to leave the safety of the pocket so Lance can lace their fingers together. A shiver goes through Keith’s body.  
“Did you…?” He doesn’t finish the sentence, but he knows the look etched in his eyes, as he turns towards Lance, is hopeful.  
The torturous seconds of silence after that burst when Lance shakes his head.  
“I’m sorry Keith, I still don’t remember anything. But as we walked here my heart started to whisper that you were important to me, and throughout the day the whisper just got louder and louder. And I get what that means. What we were.”  
Keith’s heart stills when Lance lifts their hands to kiss Keith’s knuckles.  
“You shouldn’t… just because….” Keith’s protest is weak. A tiny sound Lance easily pushes down.  
“I’m sure it’s a start. And I’m sure with your help I will remember.” The plea in Lance’s eyes is hard to overlook and it’s not like Keith doesn’t want to say yes with his whole body. He pulls Lance closer, close enough for them to lean their heads against each other as they watch the ever moving ocean together.

It’s several more silent minutes before Lance’s voice interrupts the crashing of the waves again.  
“And Keith... “  
“Hm?”  
“Do you think we could bake garlic knots tonight? Something is telling me we should.”  
Keith laughs and cries at the thought that the progress after this initial start might be way faster than he could imagine.  
“Yeah… we definitely should.”


End file.
